Mobile Java is a rapidly changing area. However, the associated Java development toolkits are well engineered and they include a plethora of easy to follow examples. This helps to reduce the cost of entry into this domain. To find out some more examples, read on.

From the author of

Mobile Computing: Smaller Is Beautiful

The penetration of electronic systems into everyday life continues apace, and
nowhere is this more apparent than in the area of small mobile devices. These
represent what can be called the demand side of the mobile network, i.e., the
entities that consume the services offered by the network(s). The supply side of
the mobile network provides the required services, and it's important to
note that mobile phone networks are evolving to accommodate users' needs.
Those include the ability to use small devices (such as mobile phones) for
browsing websites, reading and sending email, downloading and playing music,
etc. The evolution of mobile computing requires a massive level of investment in
both the supply and demand sides of the network.

So, mobile computing and mobile telephony are strong growth areas, and
substantial investments are being made on both sides of the supply and demand
equation. This area is often somewhat fuzzily described as the "convergence
of multiple technologies." Despite the vague marketing-speak, however,
it's likely that impressive features will continue to be rolled out over
time. In a sense, users and device vendors are trying to overcome the
traditional limits imposed by geography by squeezing more and more capabilities
into increasingly smaller mobile devices.

In parallel with all this vendor activity, Java is evolving, too, as Sun
Microsystems attempts to position the language on the crest of the mobile
computing development wave. Keep in mind that software must be specifically
engineered for mobile elements such as consumer products, embedded devices,
mobile phones, and portable computers. This is because the spectrum of platform
types features not one but many runtime environments; therefore, the Java
platform has been modified to suit.

History teaches us that technology offerings tend to be most innovative when
resources are scarce. For example, do you remember the nineties, when exotic
things like DOS extenders and expanded memory were important? These were
specific technologies designed to try and squeeze ever more code into and
performance out of software hosted on the then-ubiquitous DOS operating system.
History is in a sense repeating itself as the mobile computing revolution
unfolds. The J2ME platform has been modified to suit the increasingly diverse
mobile device area, and that is the topic of this article.